On behalf of the ITFA team, I would like to
take this opportunity to wish you all a very Happy New Year and all the very
best for 2016. May the year ahead bring good health, peace and prosperity.
My first start to the year as Chairman of
ITFA brings with it enthusiasm for the year ahead whilst acknowledging the
challenging twelve months gone by.
2015 was an unforgiving year for
commodities and emerging markets. The major commodities across an array of
sectors which pretty much are synonymous with global trade were heavily in the
red for 2015, from the energy and mining sectors to the metals and grains
sectors. And this all boils down to one of the fundamental theories of economics
of demand and supply.
There have been sectors, such as the metals
and grains sectors which were negatively impacted by the global economic glut
(lack of demand), particularly within the Emerging Markets space. On the other
hand, the price of oil for example has been adversely impacted by supply
concerns as the leading oil-producing countries are pumping more oil than ever
before, sending oil prices to multi-year lows, the consequence of which has
driven some large energy companies into unchartered territory.
Equities, currencies, commodities, emerging
markets, bonds are amongst the key asset classes which had their fair share of
volatility in 2015, but few would have envisaged what the first trading
sessions of 2016 would have in store for most investors.
Markets gave investors a crude awakening in
the early trading sessions of 2016, with risky assets markedly off the table.
From ongoing worries about weaker economic dynamics in China, and the possible
implications this could have not only on emerging markets but also on the
global economy, additional weakness in the price of oil and geopolitical
tensions picking up in the Middle East; all these factors ensured that 2016 was
a start to the year many investors are willing to forget. And possibly the
above three themes could pretty well shape the rest of the year.
Surety has grown steadily over the last ten
years. In this issue of the newsletter, Silja Calac explains that insurance has
become a more and more important part of international trade finance. We will
also introduce you to one of the newly elected ITFA Board members; Zeyno de
Vries-Davutoglu whose role within the Board primarily entails ensuring that
ITFA members are kept abreast with the educational aspect of the industry.
We are currently compiling a list of
scheduled events for 2016. Shortly, this will be available on our ITFA
website and will be updated on an ongoing basis. We will communicate with you on this matter accordingly.
We look forward to hearing from you with
any feedback you may want to share with us by sending an email to myself, any
of the Board Members or to our general email, info@itfa.org.
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